


Preternatural Selection

by ImpishTubist



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: AU, Crack, Fluff, Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-02
Updated: 2013-09-02
Packaged: 2017-12-25 10:48:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/952174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImpishTubist/pseuds/ImpishTubist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tom Paris and Kathryn Janeway aren’t the only ones Chakotay rescues from a remote planet after Tom’s attempt to break the warp 10 barrier goes awry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Preternatural Selection

**Author's Note:**

> A while back, [](http://kim-j-8472.livejournal.com/profile)[**kim_j_8472**](http://kim-j-8472.livejournal.com/)[](http://notluvulongtime.tumblr.com/post/56382673556/just-in-case-imp-needs-proof-yes-this-is-st) posted a picture on Tumblr to show me that there actually existed a Tom Paris action figure from “Threshold,” and that it came complete with the lizard babies from the end of the episode. She then told me that, if for some reason the post got over 100 notes, I owed her some cracky C/P fic.
> 
> Guess what happened.
> 
> Many thanks to [](http://thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com/profile)[**thesmallhobbit**](http://thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com/) for suggesting names for the babies, and thanks to [](http://kim-j-8472.livejournal.com/profile)[**kim_j_8472**](http://kim-j-8472.livejournal.com/) for the brilliant title.  I hope you enjoy, my friend. It was fun to write!  
>   
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> * * *
> 
>   
> _Preternatural: beyond what is normal or natural._
> 
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> * * *
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> 

All things considered, Tom was handling it well.

“You brought them back?”

Sort of.

“Tom -”

“You brought them _back_?” he bellowed. “You’re telling me that not only did I _mate_ with the Captain and produce - produce _lizard babies_ , but you brought them back to the ship? Are you out of your mind?”

“Look, I had to, all right?” Chakotay said in exasperation. Tom tossed off the thin Starfleet-issue blanket and pushed himself into a sitting position. Chakotay grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him down onto the biobed. “Oh, no, you don’t.”

“Chakotay, I feel _fine,_ ” Tom protested.

Chakotay glared at him. “Tom, let’s review your day, shall we? You broke the warp 10 barrier, mutated into an amphibian, kidnapped Captain Janeway, broke the warp 10 barrier _again_ , and then mated with her to produce three _very hungry_ babies.”

Tom grimaced. “Hungry?”

Chakotay sighed. “They’re currently eating their way through Kes’s hydroponics bay.”

“Well, what the hell did you bring them back for?” Tom muttered in agitation. “You still haven’t explained that, _Commander_.”

“Because you wouldn’t let me leave that damn planet without them!” Chakotay snapped.

“I - what?”

Chakotay rubbed his temples, feeling the beginnings of a blistering headache take root behind his eyes. “You started hissing and spitting the moment I told the transporter room to lock onto your signals. You might have been an amphibian being, Tom, but you knew exactly what I was saying. You only stopped when I had the transporter lock onto all seven signals.”

Tom frowned at him.

“You could have just beamed the two of us up anyway and left the... offspring behind,” he pointed out. “It’s not like I could have stopped you.”

Chakotay shifted uncomfortably.

“You were pretty agitated,” he said after a moment.

“So?” Tom pressed. “I was a _lizard,_ Chakotay!”

“I don’t think lizard is the right term -”

“Not the point!”

“Okay,” Chakotay said hastily, holding up his hands. “But you were still you. Well, technically, anyway.”

“I -” Tom stopped, and then blinked at him. “You couldn’t stand making me upset, could you?”

“Listen -”

“I don’t believe this!” Tom burst out. “You couldn’t say no to a _lizard_?”

“I couldn’t say no to _you_ , Tom, all right?” Chakotay snapped. 

“I wasn’t me!”

“I beg to differ!”

“Gentlemen, if I could have a moment,” the Doctor cut in, appearing at Chakotay’s elbow.

“Yeah, hold on a sec, Doc,” Tom said briskly.

“But Commander -”

“Not _now_ , Doctor,” Chakotay snapped.

“Yes, now,” the Doctor said impatiently. “I really must speak to you both -”

“Doctor, unless the next words out of your mouth are _the amphibian offspring have turned into humans as well_ , this is not the time,” Chakotay growled. 

There was a deadly silence, and cold slid into Chakotay’s stomach. He whipped around. Released from Chakotay’s harsh gaze, Tom slid off of the biobed and stood on unsteady legs next to his partner.

“Doc,” Tom said slowly, as though he doubted the Doctor’s sanity, “that’s not possible.”

The Doctor gave an amiable shrug. He was almost bouncing on the balls of his feet and looked decidedly excited. Chakotay hated that expression on the Doctor’s face. It never boded well for any of them, because what the Doctor found new and interesting usually turned out to be terrifying. 

“Apparently it is, Mr. Paris,” he said happily. “The lizard babies, as you so quaintly call them, are now human babies.”

“How?” Chakotay demanded.

“My best guess, at this point,” the Doctor said cheerfully, “is that when I returned you and the Captain to your natural states, it triggered something in the DNA of your reptilian offspring. Their DNA reverted to that of a human, and they appear now as they would if you and Captain Janeway had, in fact, reproduced.”

Chakotay felt Tom sway, and he put out a hand to steady him. 

“But I won’t know for sure, of course,” the Doctor went on, striding over to the other side of the room, “until the babies arrive. Kes said that they started transforming in the hydroponics bay. She’s bringing them up now.”

The Doctor retrieved three medical bassinets while Chakotay and Tom looked on, completely dumbfounded. 

“Did he just say -”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Tom said weakly. He swallowed. “Babies.”

“Yeah.”

“Three… babies.”

“Yeah.”

“Three _human_ babies.”

“Yeah.”

“You know, it would be _really_ helpful if you could think of something else to say.”

Chakotay wracked his brain for a moment. 

“I hope they have the Captain’s looks,” he said finally. Tom gave a weak chuckle that skittered up the scale, and Chakotay put a bracing hand on his shoulder. “Stranger things have happened, Tom.”

“Like what?”

“I - I don’t know, it just sounded right.”

“Okay.”

The doors to Sickbay slid open just then, and Kes stepped through. She was carrying a squirming bundle, as were two of the security men who followed her. The babies were placed in the bassinets, and Kes and the Doctor set to work checking them over. Chakotay craned his neck, but the high sides of the bassinets concealed the babies’ faces completely. Tom’s hand found his own, and he laced their fingers together. 

“What a day,” Chakotay said quietly. He turned his head and pressed his lips to Tom’s temple. “You should lay down for a bit.”

“No.”

Chakotay slid an arm around his waist, for Tom still looked unsteady on his feet and his face was bloodless. Tom accepted the half-embrace and leaned into the touch, allowing Chakotay to support at least some of his weight, and they waited in companionable silence for the Doctor to finish.

“Well, they’re healthy,” the Doctor announced happily half an hour later, finally striding back over to Chakotay and Tom. “It seems as though they went through an accelerated growth period during their time as - well, whatever they were. They’re now about six months old, and they’ll grow at a normal human rate from now on. What would you like to name them?”

“Names?” Tom asked blankly. The Doctor rolled his eyes.

“I’ll need the information for my medical log,” he said, as though it was obvious. 

“We could name one of them Lizzie,” Chakotay said helpfully, his words deadly serious, and Tom gave a laugh that was more a whimper than anything else. 

“They’re all boys,” the Doctor said. “Though Lizzie _is_ a male name on the planet Krin, and there it means -”

“Not helping, Doctor,” Chakotay said quickly as Tom paled dangerously.

“Boys,” he croaked as it finally sank in.

“Yes, indeed, Lieutenant,” the Doctor said cheerfully. He beamed at them. “Congratulations. You have three sons!”

“Okay, _really_ not helping, Doctor,” Chakotay said briskly. He took hold of Tom’s elbow to keep him upright and said to the Doctor, “Listen, give us a few moments, all right?”

“I need -”

“I know, I know, you need names,” Chakotay said impatiently. “We’ll get them to you, I promise.”

The Doctor nodded, and he finally retreated to his office. Tom turned to Chakotay.

“I can’t do this,” he said flatly. Chakotay rubbed his arm.

“No one’s going to ask you to do something you don’t want to,” he said, his words more calm than he felt. Tom pinched the bridge of his nose.

“I was just trying to do something meaningful,” he muttered. “Something that _mattered_. Something no one else had done before.”

“Well, I’d say you succeeded as far as that last point goes,” Chakotay said wryly. Tom thumped him on the arm. 

“Not like this,” he said, though there was a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. Chakotay put a hand on his shoulder.

“Come on. Let’s go see them.”

He was pleased, in the end, to see that he’d been right - the babies had, for the most part, inherited Kathryn’s looks. They had her nose and lips, and their thin hair was a deep brown as opposed to Tom’s sandy blond. Two of the babies were awake, and they stared up at Tom and Chakotay out of the endlessly-blue eyes that Chakotay woke up to every morning--it seems they hadn’t inherited _all_ of Kathryn’s features.

“Jesus,” Tom breathed. He held out a finger to one of the babies, who grabbed it happily. “Can you imagine what would have happened if you had left them there?”

“Don’t think about that right now, Tom,” Chakotay scolded gently. The nearest baby to him was swaddled in a yellow blanket, and he stooped to pick him up out of the bassinet. “Oh, you’re a big one, aren’t you? And you like my pips, I see.”

The baby had reached for the pips at Chakotay’s throat, and he was trying to tug them off his uniform. Tom chuckled. 

“He’s going to be a handful.”

“Just like his father,” Chakotay said with a wink. 

Tom picked up the baby who was holding his finger. The child didn’t release him, even when he was settled comfortably against Tom’s chest.

“What do you think the Captain wants to do?” Tom asked finally. Chakotay shrugged. 

“I don’t know,” he said honestly. “But I think what matters right now is what _you_ want to do.”

Tom gave a quiet huff.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said honestly. 

“I don’t think that any of us do,” Chakotay pointed out. “But Tom, you wouldn’t let me leave them behind on that planet. I think you know what you _want_ to do, even if you’re not sure of how to go about doing it.”

Tom was silent for a long time, watching the baby in his arms slowly drift off into sleep again. 

“And whatever you choose,” Chakotay said gently, “I’ll support it.”

“Even if it means moving three infants into our quarters?” Tom said dryly. 

Chakotay leaned over and kissed him. The baby he was holding gave a quiet giggle. 

“Even if it means us moving into the living room so the babies can have the bedroom,” he said quietly. He kissed Tom’s forehead. “Yes. I’m happy with whatever you choose, so long as _you’re_ happy with it.”

Tom’s eyes were over-bright when Chakotay pulled away, and he quickly looked away in order to conceal it. The baby in the bassinet started to fuss, and Chakotay put a hand on his stomach, slowly rubbing it in soothing circles until the child calmed again.

“If the Captain’s not opposed,” Tom said finally, his words thick, “then I think I’d like that.”

He cleared his throat, sniffed, and added, “And I vote that at least one of them needs to be named Fred.”

“Fred,” Chakotay said, trying out the name on his tongue. He smiled. “I think I could get used to that. You’ll have to run it by Kathryn first, though.”

“She names one, I name one. It’s only fair.”

“She can pull rank on you, you know.”

Tom merely smiled in response before dropping his gaze back to the baby he was holding. He cupped the infant’s head with his hand and gently stroked his thumb across the baby’s temple. 

“Thank you,” he said quietly. “I don’t know why you put up with the things that I do.”

Chakotay leaned over and pressed his lips to the side of Tom’s head.

“Well, I do,” he whispered. “And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”   



End file.
